


The Golden Snidget

by Delphi



Series: Fantastic Beasts [13]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M, Quidditch, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-09
Updated: 2016-01-09
Packaged: 2018-05-12 18:20:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5675902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Delphi/pseuds/Delphi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Severus shows at least a modicum of house spirit at a Quidditch match, and Silvanus extends an invitation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Golden Snidget

The first true day of spring coincided with the second to last Quidditch game of the school year, bringing the smell of mud, new grass, and damp wool together with the high spirits of pent-up children finally let loose out of doors. The sun had come out for what felt like the first time in weeks, and the students seemed to be operating via photosynthesis, all but thrumming in their seats under the blue sky as they cheered and stomped and whooped for the lively match.

It was difficult to begrudge them their joy, but Severus still managed. He could have done without the spontaneous ejaculations of fireworks and confetti from the back row, and he winced whenever the shrieks of the girls and the first-year boys hit a certain high note that threatened to make his ears bleed. Nonetheless, even he clapped his hands together in a burst of instinctive applause when Miss Beauchamp, the Slytherin Seeker, executed a sudden dive that brought her within arm's reach of the snitch. His clapping soon gave way to a disappointed groan—echoed in the stands around him—as she was knocked off her broom by a Hufflepuff Bludger just as she grabbed for a fluttering wing.

The Snitch changed direction and zipped out of sight.

Next to him, Silvanus glanced up from his notebook and looked around at the jeering students. "What just happened?"

"A near-capture followed by a lateral Bludger strike." He saw the blank expression in Silvanus's eyes, considered explaining in more depth, and then thought better of it. "You should be sitting with the Ravenclaws."

"Why? They aren't playing today." Silvanus scanned the field as if to make certain there wasn't any blue lurking among the green and yellow.

"Because you're a Ravenclaw."

Silvanus gave him an exasperated look, as if Severus were the one breaking social protocol. "I am a grown man."

Severus looked at the notes that Silvanus had been making. What appeared to be a travel itinerary took up one side of the spread, setting out the packing requirements and ticket purchases for his upcoming summer expedition. On the other side was the outline for some sort of alchemical analysis procedure. While Severus was in the middle of trying to decipher the latter, Silvanus applied pencil to paper once more and wrote the word "Coitus?" followed by an arrow that seemed to be pointing down at his crotch.

Severus felt his face go purple in one upward lurch of blood. His throat closed in choked indignation as he glanced furtively around to make sure no one else had seen the note. The students were still engrossed by the match and their own inane chatter.

Silvanus looked up, sighed at his reaction, and then clarified by sketching a rough approximation of the stands. He then redrew the arrow to indicate the area beneath them.

The violent flush of outrage receded, at least halfway. He glared at Silvanus nonetheless.

Silvanus then drew a rough row of people sitting in the stands and crossed them out with a slash of the pencil. He added a crescent moon and a scattering of stars in the imaginary night sky. Another question mark was offered up entreatingly.

Despite the lingering heat in his cheeks and the urge to set Silvanus's notebook on fire, he could not help but give the proposal some consideration. He blamed the sunshine for putting foolish thoughts in his head. It wasn't what would be called warm anywhere else in the country, but after months of snow and freezing rain from a constant shroud of grey clouds, he was almost fooled into wanting to take off his cloak. 

The thought of a mild night-time breeze and Silvanus's hands on his skin wisped through his mind. It wasn't without its appeal. Neither was the idea of warm breath on his neck, followed by even warmer lips, and the pleasure of doing something he wasn't supposed to do, somewhere he wasn't supposed to do it, the need for silence and caution adding an illicit thrill to the proceedings. There was less chance of being discovered by Filch out of doors than, say, in their classrooms or in the library, as Silvanus had previously proposed and Severus had previously refused. 

Less chance, yes, but not no chance at all. The potential humiliation at being discovered swiftly quashed his fledgling interest. 

He shook his head and mouthed a firm 'no' for extra emphasis before returning his attention to the match.

"I'll be off to Kenya soon enough," Silvanus pointed out.

Severus merely hummed a sound of vague interest, as if this were an apropos of nothing attempt at small talk.

"I won't have the chance to see another Quidditch match all summer," Silvanus continued.

Mr. Chorley chose that moment to demonstrate his keenness, whirling around in his seat in front of them with the bright-eyed look of a swot who enjoyed correcting his teachers. "Actually, Professor Kettleburn, there's the Nairobi Nyati. They play out of..."

He trailed off when faced with Severus's glower and Silvanus's stare of incomprehension. He silently turned around again.

"I'm sure you'll persevere, Professor Kettleburn," Severus commented.

Silvanus's eyebrows rose briefly in acknowledgement. He returned to his work, scribbling and then crossing out alchemical links and occasionally pausing to sketch little water buffaloes. Thus engaged, he entirely missed it when Miss Beauchamp and her Hufflepuff rival suddenly took hairpin turns in mid-air and executed a breathtaking twin spiral dive for the Snitch that brought every other spectator to their feet. The pair of Seekers plummeted to the earth and landed with a crash.

Severus took part in the audible hush of held breath.

Miss Beauchamp, lying wide-eyed on her back in the mud, raised her gloved fist. Protruding from her grip was a small thrumming wing.

"Ha!" Severus cried in triumph.

Silvanus had the decency to tuck his pencil into his pocket and applaud politely when the Slytherin section erupted in ecstatic cheers around him.

"Who won?" he asked as Severus sat back down, still clapping enthusiastically.

"We did," Severus reported smugly.

"Ah." Silvanus flashed a bland smile. "Good."

Startled by the hammering of stomping feet, Mouse darted out from under the bench and leaped up into Severus's lap, her ears pricked up and her tail wagging fiercely. She spun around and nearly nailed him in the privates with a misplaced paw.

" _Oof!_ Off, beast!"

Severus knew very well that she understood the command, but the creature chose to interpret it as 'lie down' instead. She flattened across his thighs, looking about at all the cheering students, her stubby tail vibrating fast enough to rival the Snitch. Silvanus reached over to scratch her behind the ear, but didn’t order her down, the traitor.

The three of them were the last to leave the stands. Silvanus was slow on the stairs and Severus himself had no wish to be held up and jostled by jaw-boning students with sticky hands. Last match, he had ended up with someone's half-eaten gobstopper stuck to the hem of his robes. He let the rows behind them empty out as the Slytherin team carried a possibly-concussed Miss Beauchamp off the field on their shoulders, and then made his way down the aisle at Silvanus's side, allowing his elbow to be enlisted due to the lack of a handrail.

"If you're not going to indulge me," Silvanus said, picking up the conversation as if there hadn't been a break, "then you should consider coming with me."

"To where," Severus asked absently, having already assumed the answer would be 'to my bedroom' and scanning the crowded grounds for a clear but discreet path into the castle.

"To Kenya."

Severus halted, his foot hovering uncertainly for an instant before coming down on the next step.

"If you feel your summer projects can travel," Silvanus amended, pausing alongside him.

Severus recovered, resisting the urge to stupidly ask Silvanus to repeat himself. His next instinct was to scoff. Kenya might as well have been the moon for how readily he could picture himself there. He felt an uneasy sense of seasick ignorance. Certainly there would be...papers involved. Travel documents. Permits or applications of some sort. Special clothing. International Floo Points. Translation spells. 

Which was all to say that he had never travelled anywhere requiring more than a train ticket and an overnight bag. He had only left the British Isles once, and then only for an overnight trip to Calais. Not that he considered his mental map of the world any barer for the limitation, filled in as it was by books and second-hand accounts, and by a childhood of documentary radio and television. He simply hadn’t heretofore needed to travel, and frankly he doubted if the headmaster would even allow—

Here, contrariness made his opinion pivot from apprehension to resentment. It was one thing to decline to travel, and another entirely to be banned from it. Why shouldn’t he be allowed to leave the country? He wasn’t under any formal parole. His summers were meant to be his to do with as he pleased, and the thought of voyaging to another continent with an experienced guide, to take part in a scientific expedition that might presumably, now that he thought of it, also allow for leisure, reading, and sex, pleased him very much. 

“Is that a genuine invitation?” he finally asked.

Silvanus glanced at him and shrugged. “Yes. Why not? I could do with the company.”

“And someone to carry your things for you,” Severus accused him mildly.

That earned him a wry smile. “Always an added bonus.”

They reached the bottom of the stairs, where Mouse was already rolling around in the damp grass, staining her white patches with streaks of green. Severus opened his mouth to impetuously accept, Professor Dumbledore be damned, and then chanced to look back at the shadowy space beneath the stands. A niggle of suspicion turned quickly into a full-blown itch.

He looked at Silvanus. 

Silvanus looked back at him, his features composed in the picture of ignorant expectation.

Severus narrowed his eyes.

The innocent look held itself too long to be credible.

“You had no intention of…” Severus began, his voice low as he gestured vaguely to the stands. “You just wanted to start with something I’d say no to so that your second suggestion seemed more reasonable in comparison.”

Silvanus did not try to deny it, nor did he look the least bit repentant. “I wouldn’t have said no if you had said yes, but one of us would have probably ended up with a splinter.”

"Do you really think you need to manipulate me into everything?" Severus asked, hastily reclaiming his arm now that his services were no longer required. 

“As suspicious as you are?” Silvanus removed his hand obligingly and gave him a fond look. "Imagine what you'd accuse me of if I didn't at least put forth a token effort. So what say you?"

Severus rolled his eyes.

“I’ll think about it,” he said, but he suspected they both already knew what his answer would be. God help him, he was going to need new boots.


End file.
